Monologues and dialogue are carefully distributed and intertwined throughout the play. While I felt Electra overreacted as she tirelessly ranted to herself about her dilemma, I also started to sympathize with her every time her and her mom began to quarrel. I imagine Sophocles intended to instill within us the same dilemma Electra herself felt.
It appears that Sophocles depended more on the narration and delivery of events than the actual visualization of them. Instead of acting out the murder of Clytemnestra, for example, the characters portray the scene through dialogue and emotion. I found myself analyzing the tone, expressions, and words of each character instead of mindlessly watching a dagger come down.
Aegisthus's death is no different. Instead of anticipating a Lord of the Ring's style epic fight scene were the good triumphantly destroys the bad, we witness a short, yet heated exchange, and are left to assume he dies.
By understanding Sophocles' use of narration, we can better understand the dialogue of the play.
I think that your observation is valid and his reasoning behind it. If you think back to ancient Greek drama, they did not have the special effects and props that were required for an action seen. It would make sense for a writer to put those scenes into narration because it was not common for them to be actually acted out
ReplyDeletei think that this play's writing was ingenuous because as mentioned above they could not have done the action seen justice in a play so they leave the action part up to our own imagination. This makes everyone happy because they get to imagine it how they please. also the delivery of the narration causes you to be on edge, wondering what will happen next and if they really did kill the mom.
ReplyDeleteThis was a cool break from the animation and special effects so often used in today's movies. Everything has some sort of action scene, otherwise we seem to lose our attention. I agree with what you said, and I think that by keeping all the big actions off stage, we get to concentrate more on the dialogue and relationships going on on stage.
ReplyDeleteI recently listened to a piece on NPR that speaks of something very similar. Today, films that have less action and more narration are extremely low-budget and a few have hugely grossed. Think of the Paranormal Activity movies. Most of the action is reported but not depicted. The same tactics are used today and have proven to be very successful!
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that the fact that all the action happened off-stage. But I think that this served a purpose. Because the Greeks prized good oratory, if Sophocles could convey the emotion and intensity of death with words, then that would showcase his ability as an orator and playwright.
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